No Real Title

I have noticed that I tend to have a “theme” behind each posting. My original idea in creating this blog was to keep people back home aware of my current situation, to share my experience, and to make a little ad revenue from the advertisement in the corner (8 cents per click-through, just to let you know. This format seems to work, since I don’t get too many complaints. It is the most popular Kochkor-based blog on the web, unless Erin’s is somehow doing better than mine. Either way, it is definitely in the top two at worst.
I don’t really have much of topic to discuss, so I guess I will just talk about what is going on here right now. First and most important, spring has finally arrived. The trees are blooming, the grass is green, and dogs are humping everything in sight. It is truly a wonderful time of year in Kochkor. With the warm weather, I have noticed that I am more active as well. I don’t mind walking to someone’s office for a meeting. I also have started going on walks just for the fun of it. Who would have thunk it?
Today especially is a great day because I have finished my Small Projects Assistance (SPA) proposal to fund the Ak Sakaldar Sotu conference that I am organizing for September (read related article for more info). The proposal is 13 pages long, which is not especially large by any stretch, but it was extremely difficult to complete. First of all, it is an application for US Federal dollars, so it has a lot of asinine requirements (and by asinine I mean wonderful, just in case anybody from USAID is reading this). Second, gathering information in Kyrgyzstan is a pain in the ass. Nobody will give you a straight answer, no matter how you phrase a question. Luckily, I have an awesome counterpart named Ak Jol working with me on the project and he knows how to get things done. Lastly, we have to constantly write in “Peace Corps speech,” using all the taglines that we have learned from various trainings over the past 10 months: sustainable, community driven, monitoring and evaluation, and priority.
I will say, however, that the best part of my proposal is the name: Kalpaks Optional!. Kalpaks are the traditional Kyrgyz hats that the old men around here wear. I guess it really isn’t that funny if you don’t know what a kalpak is. Actually, it really isn’t funny even if you do know what a kalpak is. I am still a firm believer of the power of titles. And it has an exclamation point in it. I can’t think of a single bad movie, book, or album that has an exclamation point in it. Ipso facto, everything with an exclamation point in it is awesome. You know what book didn’t have an exclamation point? Mein Kampf and we all know what happened with that.
What a terrible way to end a blog entry.